A long time ago, when we were in college, we all piled into a car and went to visit the White Witch of Cobh. To cut a long story short – she gave us all private readings lasting about 20 minutes each. After a fairly vague nothing new kind of a reading, with the exception of one piece of information – I would die at 72. (At the time 72 was so far away I was delighted – today I’m not so sure.) Just before she finished she offered me the opportunity to ask 3 questions – the Crystal would give me the answers. (Amazing how you just go along with all kinds of mumbo jumbo.) Here’s how it would work: I ask three questions that have yes or no answers. She would hold a crystal at the end of a chain – very still – and after I asked the question the crystal would swing to the right for YES and to the left for NO. Yeah! Crystal Swing.

“Would I live beyond my 72nd birthday?” was the first question I asked – the crystal swung violently to the right. Holy Moly! The White Witch got it wrong. I forget the second question but the last one was – “Would I ever win the Lotto?” and the crystal swung violently to the left. Bummer. But by the law of averages (whatever that is) maybe the crystal got that wrong too.

I have been playing Lotto off and on since, especially when there is a big payout, but on Sunday I read in John Water’s column in The Irish Independent that if you bought a Lotto ticket on a Monday there’s a better chance of you dying before you’d collect the Lotto winnings on the Saturday night. Now, I don’t know what to do…

This picture of Cobh could be Positano on the  The Almalfi Coast on a dull day.